


The Master Of My Fate

by likethenight



Category: King Arthur (2004)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-23
Updated: 2014-12-23
Packaged: 2018-03-03 01:10:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2832719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/likethenight/pseuds/likethenight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alone at the end of all things, Gawain reflects upon his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Master Of My Fate

**Author's Note:**

> The title is taken from the last two lines of W E Henley's poem _Invictus_ : "I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul."

It had been a long life, and an eventful life, for Gawain. More eventful than most, for he had been swept up by the Roman army when he was barely more than a child, taken as payment for a debt incurred by his forefathers and pressed into fifteen years of servitude. Fifteen years of being a soldier, unwanted, unasked-for, defending an empire that was not his own, a border that should have been none of his concern, thousands of miles from his home on the plains of Sarmatia. He should have seen out his life riding across the plains, hunting rabbits, farming sheep, breeding horses; he should have had a wife, a girl from the next village, and a brood of children to teach the way of things, to grow up and take over the work, to give him grandchildren and eventually to mourn him at the end of his days. But thanks to Rome, he had seen not a glimpse of this long and peaceful life. His life had been long, that was not to be denied, but it had certainly not been peaceful.

Fifteen years of the Roman army, riding out with his brother knights, given a higher rank than the legionaries due to their status as cavalry, but always kept at arm's length by the rest of the army who sensed their difference, resented their treatment and their tendency to band together. The Sarmatians moved as a pack, the Roman soldiers would say, sticking together like dogs, and the knights did nothing to dispel this impression. They had no mind to mix with the rest of the soldiers, for they all knew that they did not belong here. They were all here against their will, all of them retaining their independence and pride; no Sarmatian knight would ever willingly describe himself as being part of the Roman army. They were all there under sufferance, serving out their fifteen years because they had no choice, but almost all of the survivors left as soon as their time was up.

So there had been no normal life for Gawain; his own normality had been his duty to Rome. Not that he or any of the other Sarmatians thought of it as a duty. The Romans looked at it that way, perhaps, but the Sarmatians knew it was nothing but servitude.

And there had been no wife for Gawain. Some of the knights had taken women, fathered children, and some of them had stayed with these impromptu families when their service was up; others left them behind when they returned to Sarmatia, presumably taking other wives when they got home. Still others took lovers but spoke only of returning to Sarmatia and finding wives, taking over their fathers' farms and carrying on the traditions of their people, and presumably sending their own sons to serve Rome. So had it been for generations; Gawain's own father had served his fifteen years in Rome's cavalry, and it was always accepted that he and his three younger brothers would go with the soldiers when they came to take them away.

Gawain was not the only one who had taken no woman to him, wed no British girl, fathered no children. He had never felt an interest in the women of the fort, and though he used to joke with the other knights, spinning tales of going home and marrying a fine Sarmatian woman, he had never had any real intention of doing either thing. His companion throughout the dark nights and the long days had been the boy who had been his constant shadow from the day the Romans had collected them from their respective villages, the boy who had almost instantly become his best friend, his confidant, the other half of his soul. Galahad, the youngest of their company, though not all that much younger than Gawain himself, had been all and everything to Gawain from the moment they met to the moment Galahad drew his last breath. They were old men by then, old enough to have seen all their friends pass before them into the care of their gods, venerated by those younger than them as the old friends and trusted counsellors of the Britons' first king.

Bors had gone before them, older than the two of them as he was, and Vanora had followed him not long after, all their many children grown up into formidable warriors, combining their father's bravery and their mother's determination. They had argued almost all the time, but when Bors was gone Vanora seemed simply to fade away, purposeless at last, and they buried her beside her man within the season.

Guinevere had never given Arthur a child. Her stomach had remained flat and her womb empty, year upon year, until her childbearing years were gone and her beauty had hardened into lines and ironclad will. She acted always as though it did not matter, but Gawain was skilled at reading her, from the careful distance that he kept between them, and he did not miss the emptiness in her eyes, the bitterness when she watched her husband with Lucan, the boy who had been rescued along with Guinevere from the oubliette of Marius Honorius. Lucan had been Arthur's lieutenant ever since he had been old enough to draw Dagonet's sword from his grave-mound, and he was the only obvious successor, given Arthur and Guinevere's lack of an heir. He was a good man and a fine leader, but he was not Guinevere's own child, and Gawain felt that he was watching Guinevere's dreams of an empire crumble away every time he saw the queen with her husband's chosen heir.

Arthur and Guinevere had become almost like strangers to each other, over the years, the political expedience and the initial passion that had brought them together eventually wearing off; they had drifted apart. And Arthur had never been able to forget Lancelot, after all; he could not look at Guinevere without feeling the guilt for the lover he had abandoned as soon as she had appeared.

And Gawain had survived them all. Arthur had died and Lucan had succeeded to the throne, Guinevere had taken herself off to a nunnery, unable to watch her people being led by a man who was not her son. Gawain and Galahad had remained behind, seeing Lucan safely into his new role, advising him until he did not need them any more, and then they had withdrawn to the coast, old men now in need of the sea air and the peace and the cry of the gulls.

And eventually Galahad too had died, old age coming to claim him at last. Gawain was alone, now, living the life of a hermit although he was certainly no holy man, no Christian prophet in a cave. He lived a quiet, simple life in the hut he had shared with Galahad, in a sheltered combe set a little way back from the sea, and he said his prayers to his own gods, and he waited for them to come and claim him, as the Romans had claimed him so long ago. His life had been long and it had been very far from peaceful, for even after his fifteen years of service were over he had remained to stand by Arthur's side during the birthing of this new nation of united Britons. He had fought the Saxon invaders, and he had stood in defence of this nation by his own choice at last. He had seen the kingdom through its first decades, a steady hand on the tiller, standing at Arthur's side still, for his loyalty lay with Arthur, in the end, and not with Rome. He had been the master of his own fate, in the end, and although he had not returned home, he had found a home of his own here in this green, chilly land, and he had no regrets that he could think of. He had made his peace with himself and with his gods long ago. This new Britain was in safe hands and it did not need him now; he would wait for the gods to come for him, and be at peace, his spirit free at last to roam the plains of Sarmatia as a son of the Horse Mother, alongside all his brothers and the other half of his soul.

**Author's Note:**

> The idea of Gawain as a kind of hermit is a reference to one of the legends which sought to explain what happened to him after the battle of Camlann - the myth relates that Gawain went away into Wales and lived as a hermit in a cave by the sea near the place which is now called St Govan's after him. Meanwhile, the reference to the Horse Mother is part of the theme running through my KA fics that the Sarmatians worshipped Epona, the horse goddess, in one form or another.
> 
> One of these days I will write the retelling of the Arthurian legends centring on Gawain that I've been threatening to write for most of my adult life...


End file.
